How is the USAFA Commandant selected?

W

whynotnow

Member
Joined
Oct 6, 2019
Messages
41
I apologize if this is the wrong forum for this question, but since there seems to be a lot of military folk here it seemed more appropriate than the parents forum.

I know that the USAFA Superintendent is appointed by the President, but how does the Commandant get selected? I read that the Air Force selects the person. What does that mean exactly? Is there a selection board or process? I'm assuming so but do not find the process spelled out anywhere.

Thank you.
 
I was not a flag officer; the AF as brilliant as it is, realized that would be a mistake when they realized I was actually eligible. However I have a bunch of classmates that were flag's, including one that was the CSAF.

Flag's meet a promotion board, I "believe" chaired by a 3-star...comprised of 1-2 stars. The record is meticulously examined...and I mean deep. While I've been told each officer "scores" the record and the highest gets selected...I had a retired 3-star tell me that just one board member can say no and that's that.

So...assume an officer has been chosen for O-7 (BGen)...they get an assignment as a new GO...if that goes well...then they may have said "this is a job I'd love" or more likely the "powers that be" will say "this is the right position for General XXXX..." and they're selected.

As I said, not having worn a star, I can only surmise from what friends and mentors have told me.

Steve
USAFA ALO
USAFA '83
 
I do not have special knowledge within the USAF but based on DoD Rules and US Law, I suspect that it is similar to the Navy. First of all, while officially it is the President who appoints the Superintendent, you can be assured that the President does not personally review potential candidates and then choose the winner. This is done within the Dept of the Air Force and is then forwarded to the president for approval. The USNA commandant is an O6 and although this is a highly visible billet, the process is not that different from a number of other top O6 jobs and basically, the Naval Personnel Command works up a slate of potential nominees and then has to get approval from the various stakeholders. The Personnel folks would of course use candidate's own duty preferences as Flieger83 stated to start with. Although USAF Commandant is a one star, I would bet that the process is similar even though in the end, the General's assignment has to be nominated to and then approved by the US Senate.
 
@flieger83 and @OldRetSWO Thank you for taking the time to reply. The fog is clearing and I have a better picture of the process now.

This leads to another question, what is a flag officer? I'm afraid my ignorance is really showing now.
 
whynotnow said:
@flieger83 and @OldRetSWO Thank you for taking the time to reply. The fog is clearing and I have a better picture of the process now.

This leads to another question, what is a flag officer? I'm afraid my ignorance is really showing now.
Click to expand...
Flag officer is an admiral or general, a tier of officer that starts at paygrade O-7. They have their own flag showing the number of stars reflecting their rank, one-star through 4-stars. Similar to C-suite and senior executives in the corporate world, some of the processes relating to their assignment are different than for all other officers.
 
For USNA, the first step in Commandant selection is identifying a senior O-6 who is a USNA grad and who is on track to make Admiral / General (USMC) -- these are the true superstars. For this reason, is very, very rare for a Commandant who successfully completes his/her tour not to make flag rank. Another factor is the warfare specialty -- first, (to date), they must be in Unrestricted Line (i.e., no Supply Corps). There is an unwritten rule that the Superintendent and Commandant will not be in the same warfare specialty (i.e., aviation), so if the current Supe is an aviator (as is the case today, an aviator won't be chosen as Dant). Next factor is rotation. While a candidate could rotate a bit early or late from his/her current billet, they're typically not going to take someone who just started a job elsewhere or hold someone in a current billet significantly beyond rotation date. Usually, Commandants come directly from a fleet (sea) billet so they bring current operational experience, so a superstar in a shore billet may be at a disadvantage.

I believe for USNA purposes that a list of candidates is provided to the Superintendent who interviews them. The Supe has significant input into the final selection.

Also, as mentioned above, the Supe is not selected by the President. As with all flag officers, the President officially/formally nominates the Supe, who must be confirmed by Congress. I'm not sure exactly how the process works, though the CNO is likely heavily involved. Some of the same elements that apply to Dants also apply to Supes. Some of the differences . . . the Supe by law must retire at the end of his/her tour. Thus, they have to think about choosing someone who is (most likely) not on track for a 4th star. This is not a question of ability -- part of how far you can go relates to the jobs you've had, who've you've worked for and where they are now, your political connections, etc.

From what I've heard, given all the requirements, there is typically a fairly small pool of available 2- and 3-star officers from whom to choose. There has been a move afoot in recent years to select a USMC officer as Supe. However, the pool of USNA grads at the 2- and 3-star level in the USMC is very small. In any event, it's yet to happen (though there have been USMC Commandants).
 
usna1985 said:
Some of the differences . . . the Supe by law must retire at the end of his/her tour. Thus, they have to think about choosing someone who is (most likely) not on track for a 4th star.
Click to expand...
> Does anyone know if this applies to all of the Service Academies ? My recollection is that this came into play for Navy when Admiral Larson came back for his second Supe tour. I forget what the controversy de jure was at the time, but ADM Larson came back to cure some evil. The reasoning at the time was that having a Flag Officer on his /her last tour would not be beholden to pressures from the puzzle palace down the road.
 
Old Navy BGO said:
> Does anyone know if this applies to all of the Service Academies ? My recollection is that this came into play for Navy when Admiral Larson came back for his second Supe tour. I forget what the controversy de jure was at the time, but ADM Larson came back to cure some evil. The reasoning at the time was that having a Flag Officer on his /her last tour would not be beholden to pressures from the puzzle palace down the road.
Click to expand...
Now you're getting into more of how the flag wardroom is detailed and yes, there is a separate office for that. As I understand it, there is a very influential SES who reports to the CNO who runs this. I've heard more but that's the headline and understand the CNO moves the pieces around the board based on a lot of different stakeholders and motivations. In the case of Adm Larson, they wanted a steadying hand on the rudder plus it was at that point that they established that it was supposed to be a twilight billet at three stars. There had been a mix of grades in the past plus Supes who went from that billet to other places. The change was to make it twlilight and lengthen the tour from the more usual 2 or 3 year flag tour to a four year tour. A couple of the supes since then have been extremely long service and senior in years served to the CNO like Rempt and Miller.

FWIW:, I attended two different Retirement Parties/Receptions for VADM Rempt and they were four apart.
 
it should be mentioned that its unheard of for the Commandant at USMA and AFA to not be a grad, ditto for the Super although there was an AFA Super a few years back who was a graduate of The Citadel. Never have understood why the Naval Academy Commandant is an O-6 when the Commandant at WePo and NA are one stars, is this a long standing Navy policy?
 
conrack said:
it should be mentioned that its unheard of for the Commandant at USMA and AFA to not be a grad, ditto for the Super although there was an AFA Super a few years back who was a graduate of The Citadel. Never have understood why the Naval Academy Commandant is an O-6 when the Commandant at WePo and NA are one stars, is this a long standing Navy policy?
Click to expand...
Longstanding difference between the services. Naval Bases, even the big ones are commanded by a Captain. Large Ships are considered to be "Major Commands and Medium to Large Shore Installations are also Major Commands and both Major Sea Commands and Major Shore Commands are O6 commands. Certain O6 commands are certainly higher profile than others and you'll frequently see new flags selected from those billets. USNA and the Aircraft Carriers are those types of billets.
 
must be a situation like the Citadel grad Super a few years back, they wanted an outsider to clean up the mess left by the alumni predecessor
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top